South Africa have pulled out of their tour of Pakistan, scheduled to begin next week, citing security concerns. The squad was scheduled to leave for Pakistan on Sunday, but a bomb blast on Friday in Karachi - local police maintain that it was not a terrorist outrage - resulted in a last-minute change of heart. South Africa were scheduled to play three Tests and three one-day internationals in Pakistan.

South Africa have attempted to placate their hosts by offering to play their series on their soil, or at a neutral venue, or even postpone it to a later date. "The decision has been taken with much regret," said Ray Mali, president of the United Cricket Board. "We know how much the tour means to the people of Pakistan and it is also a tour which we have been looking forward to. But the safety of our players is our primary concern."

The Pakistan Cricket Board were left shellshocked by the decision, coming just 36 hours after South Africa had confirmed that they would fulfil their commitments. Rameez Raja, the PCB's chief executive, confirmed that the PCB had received a fax cancelling the tour.

"They have shocked us by calling off the tour," said Raja. "It's uncalled for and disappointing."

A UCB delegation had visited Pakistan last week, and pronounced that it was safe to play, even though the PCB had refused to shift matches from Karachi and Peshawar.

Bangladesh, who finished their tour tomorrow, are the only team to have played a full series in Pakistan since the September 11 attacks in 2001. New Zealand went home midway through a tour last year after a bomb exploded outside their hotel in Karachi. Series against West Indies and Australia were then played on neutral soil, with both Sharjah and Colombo hosting Test matches.

I was looking forward to this. Wanted to see how SA does against Pakistan to get somewhat of a comparison between the pak/sa and pak/bd series. I know that's not the best way to compare but you know, the mind wonders.

It's just an excuse which they were using for past few weeks, Bangladesh cricket team is not just in the country but in the same city where it all happened but they didn't run away like these cowards!!!! The bomb blast occured in a plaza which was actually because of some land dispute but that was the BEST NEWS for South Africans who had been looking exactly for this kind of EXCUSE to pull out. Maximum i could expct after the bomb blast was a REQUEST to change the VENUE, but as i said they found the perfect excuse to cancel the tour. They think they are safe in a country where MURDER rate is highest in the world and overall crime rate one of the worst..
Maybe, we need safety from S African LOSERS who were bringing RAPIST(NTINI) and GANGSTER( HALL) in our country

Unbelieveable that UCBSA would do this, with 36 hour's notice! This does nothing to heal the various underground rifts in the ICC. BD played manfully in seven matches without running for cover, or giving the enemy (in sports terms only) any quarter. SA, if they had really wished to uphold their commitment to this tour, could have done so as well.

Want some neutral venues? Dhaka, Chittagong, Mymensingh, Jessore, Rajshahi..... Although, given the fact that Bangladeshi cricket lovers can cut through the smoke and clearly see who was at fault for cancelling this series, SA might not think, BD would be much on a neutral venue- public sympathy wise.

Sorry, being corrupted by corporate america I smell easy cash . If BCB had an ounce of marketing savvy the "neutral venue" pitch could have been sold to the south africans. Why, we could have thrown in the "brother" pitch to the pakistanis to lure them in as well. Just demonstrates in a lucid way that "NOTHING" will ever be done to increase tourist revenues in BD. Sri Lanka will tap into all this and as I am writing this they probably have chalked up a decent plan to get this going. Pathetic.

This is the main problem in the cricket now a days.The foreigner team dont want to come to play fear of terrorist.But at this present world there are terrorists through out the world.But this not fair to come an play in various venue. Plz come and play for people.